1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an information process apparatus, an information processing method, and a recording medium in which an information processing program is recorded. In particular, the present invention relates to an information processing apparatus having the function of adding additional information to an electronic document, an information processing method of the information processing apparatus, and a recording medium in which an information processing program executed in the information processing apparatus is recorded.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, technology has become widely used for adding additional information such as character information, image information, audio information and link information to optional positions on an electronic document without affecting the body of that electronic document. In the present specification, such additional information will be called annotations.
Examples of systems that can add annotations to an electronic document include DocuWorks (registered trademark) of Fuji Xerox Co., Ltd., and Acrobat (registered trademark) of Adobe Systems Incorporated.
In such systems that can add annotations to an electronic document, modes of use are conceivable where annotations are added to a common electronic document by plural users using plural information processing apparatus that each include the function of adding annotations to an electronic document. Examples of such cases include when a common electronic document such as a device manual is edited by plural editors and when collaborative work is done in conferences or meetings while referencing a common electronic document such as a plan.
In such cases, it is desired to display, in real time, annotations added by other users in all of the information processing apparatus that the users are using, so that all of the users are aware of the annotations to the electronic document being referenced; however, there are also cases where, depending on the status of the user, the user wishes to postpone the display of the annotations, such as when a particular user is personally adding an annotation.
As conventional technology that can accommodate this, there has been technology where, in a status notification system such as a buddy list system or an instant messaging system, an “action rule” for changing the manner of display of the status information of buddies and an “application status” representing a status where the action rule is applied are stored in advance with the purpose of realizing, while suppressing the operational burden of the user, the display of status information corresponding to the statuses of the users, and the display of the status information is changed in accordance with the action rule corresponding to the application status only when the status is one corresponding to the application status (e.g., see JP-A-2003-196243).
When this technology is applied to postpone the display of an annotation added by another user, a status when it is all right for the user to display the annotation (e.g., a status where the user is not personally adding an annotation) is stored in advance as the application status.
However, there have been problems in that when this technology is applied to postpone the display of an annotation added by another user, it is necessary for the user to appropriately store the application status, and the operation for this is cumbersome.